You are here

Mary Coyle

Midwest Living Review

Amber Matheson

Silver ice cream dishes and vintage soda shop phosphates conjure the images and tastes of years gone by at Mary Coyle.

The menu at this vintage ice cream shop features phosphates, ice cream sodas and 18 different varieties of sundaes. And we haven't even started on the banana bowls. The decor fits the throwback mood perfectly: orange tabletops and wood paneling abound. Owner Michael Trecaso bought Mary Coyle back in the 80s when it was just an ice cream shop. He added Italian food to the lineup, but that's not what this place is really about. On any given night, the majority of the tables are devoted to couples and families digging into calorie-laden treats of the frozen variety. All the ice cream is made in-house. We tried a Banana Butterscotch Showboat ($5.50), with vanilla ice cream, marshmallow and butterscotch toppings, nuts and bananas, and could only make it halfway through before our ice cream headache and expanding waistline got the best of us. A petite, one-scoop dish of mint Oreo ice cream ($2.35) more than fit the bill for an after-dinner digestif. The details here are great: A silver dish holding our ice cream scoop, a tall glass for the showboat. And across the front of the restaurant is a glass counter filled with different kinds of chocolate. They've clearly got their priorities straight -- ice cream for dinner, chocolate for dessert. It felt a little odd to come to a sit-down restaurant simply for ice cream, but in Highland Square, this is what everyone does, and the waitstaff expects it. So dig in and enjoy.